In 1998, Sony introduced a new type of digital still camera, the MVC-FD71 Mavica. It was the next generation in it's line of ground breaking Mavica cameras. The camera used 3.5-inch floppy disks as its image storage media, which means you can take your pictures, then remove the floppy from the camera and insert it directly into your computer without the need for any auxiliary cables or equipment. The universal JPEG compression format was used, making the camera compatible with Windows operating systems. This standard point-and-shoot camera also featured a 10x optical zoom, a built-in flash and a 2.5 inch LCD display.



I purchased one of these cameras soon after it was introduced, and the Mavica became my introduction into digital photography after almost 23 years shooting film.



In a world where everyone is chasing the next technological offering from camera manufacturers, and wanting higher and higher megapixel images, the FD71 was simple, easy to use, and had a sensor that created very cool looking, but small pictures. The Mavica gave you a picture that was, at best, approximately 330,000 pixels, or one-third of a megapixel.



I looked back at all the images I have created over a seven year period with the Mavica as my primary digital camera, and decided that many of them were great photographs. The images would just never be able to be displayed or printed very large. Here is part of my body of work from that period.



I call them my "Smalls".